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Pledge to be Toxic-Free

PLEDGE TO BE TOXIC-FREE — We should be able to trust that the products we buy are safe — especially ones our families use every day, directly on our bodies. That’s why we’re calling on major personal care product companies to pledge to go toxic-free.

We should be able to trust that the products we buy are safe — especially ones our families use every day, directly on our bodies.

We’ve looked into it, however, and discovered that when we shampoo our hair or wash our hands, we’re likely dosing our bodies with chemicals that can disrupt our hormones, cause developmental problems, and even cause cancer.

Daily exposure to chemicals of concern

Companies are allowed to put nearly any chemical they want into the products we use every day, despite the fact that the government doesn’t test those chemicals for safety or require any . As a result, we’ve seen formaldehyde in baby shampoo, phthalates in cosmetics, and more, as small amounts of chemicals of concern have become far too common in many products.

Exposure to chemicals is especially a concern when it comes to personal care products — things like hand soap, shampoo, lotion, baby wipes, shaving gel, and toothpaste — because we put them directly on our skin on a regular basis, where they can be absorbed or breathed in. On average, women use about a dozen of these products every day, and . In fact, the average person in the U.S. is exposed to more than 100 different chemicals from personal care products before they leave the house .

Manufacturers also what chemicals make up a product's "fragrance." This means consumers are left not knowing whether a product contains any of hundreds of chemicals of concern, like phthalates and styrene, because it’s typically claimed as a trade secret.

These exposures, even in very small amounts, can add up over time, and doctors warn of serious health risks as a result. That’s both dangerous and unnecessary. And this problem is especially urgent for the most vulnerable among us—babies and children—whose bodies are much more susceptible to the doses of chemicals coming from products . There’s no reason we should have to risk our health or that of our children every time we brush our teeth or put on deodorant.

That’s why we’re calling on major personal care product companies to pledge to be toxic-free.

Safe alternatives are possible and profitable

Just about everyone uses personal care products, and no one wants to get cancer—or any of the other negative health effects linked to chemicals in many of these products. So why let companies profit by exposing you to chemicals that aren’t proven safe, when they could make your favorite products without them?

Consumer demand has already started to move some companies to go toxic-free, and has helped contribute to the growth of an $11 billion . For example, Johnson & Johnson has begun to remove certain chemicals from their products, showing that this is possible and profitable. And The Honest Company, founded on a commitment to make healthy products that don’t contain chemicals of concern, has skyrocketed to a valuation of $1.7 billion within its .

If enough of us raise our voices, the rest of the industry will follow their lead. Pressure from consumers, public calls for change in the media, and shareholder demands will create the right conditions for major personal care product manufacturers such as Unilever, L’Oreal, and Procter & Gamble to respond by removing toxics from their products and disclosing all ingredients in their fragrances.

We can't afford to wait to take action

Cancer kills. Developmental problems needlessly make lives more difficult. Reproductive dysfunction brings pain and heartbreak. The list goes on. We are all exposed to the invisible threat of toxic chemicals from products in our daily lives, increasing our risk for these devastating illnesses.

We can immediately reduce the amount of chemicals we carry in our bodies by shopping for products that , but we can only solve the larger problem by getting these chemicals out of the supply chain — and that’s where personal care product manufacturers are in the best place to protect us.

When manufacturers pledge to be toxic-free, we can all rest assured that our favorite products aren’t increasing our risk of cancer, or a host of other life-altering health problems. We will be able to bathe our children and protect them from the sun with the peace of mind that we can trust what’s in our products — and without having to research a laundry list of 7-syllable ingredients. We can eliminate toxic chemicals in personal care products — and have one less thing to worry about when we get ready for the day.

We’re Calling On L’ORÉAL To Go Toxic-Free

Travel Buddy, along with other Consumer, public health, and environmental groups across the country are urging L’Oréal to disclose all of its fragrance ingredients, as well as remove carcinogens and other chemicals linked to health problems from its cosmetic products.

Together, we can make personal care products without dangerous chemicals the industry standard. Thanks to our previous work earlier this year, popular personal care product maker Unilever, which owns brands like Dove and Caress, made a bold move to announce that it would disclose most of its fragrance ingredients by 2018.

Join more than 150,000 Americans in calling on L’Oréal to pledge to be toxic-free.

Issue updates

In response to a Request for Information from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to comment on its "Blueprint to Lower Drug Prices and Reduce Out-of-Pocket Costs", we joined Consumers Union and other leading groups in a comment letter. In particular, we detail ways to rein in abusive and anti-competitive practices of both Pharmacy Benefit Managers (PBMs) and Big Pharma's brand name drug companies that force American consumers to pay too much for health care. Our comments support many of the proposals from Secretary Azar and HHS.

President Donald Trump announced today via Twitter that he has accepted the resignation of embattled Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt. In response, Kara Cook-Schultz, the director of Travel Buddy’s toxics program, released this statement:

We cannot grow healthy food without clean water and proper stewardship of our land. Today, the Senate recognized that fact by passing a Farm Bill free of attacks on core public health and environmental protections. We congratulate Senate members for their hard work to keep the Senate version of the Farm Bill clean.

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We cannot grow healthy food without clean water and proper stewardship of our land. Today, the Senate recognized that fact by passing a Farm Bill free of attacks on core public health and environmental protections. We congratulate Senate members for their hard work to keep the Senate version of the Farm Bill clean.

Ten organizations filed an Amicus brief this week in support of a 2015 landmark Montgomery County, Maryland ordinance that restricts the use of toxic pesticides on public and private land within the county.

Lead contamination in our schools is more pervasive than previously thought, according to water testing data from 20 states published in a national interactive map by Environment America and Travel Buddy today. As schools begin summer break, the groups urge public officials to take swift action to Get the Lead Out of schools’ drinking water.

We applaud L'Oréal, the manufacturer behind popular brands like Garnier, Maybelline, and numerous perfumes and colognes, for its commitment today to tell customers the ingredients in its product line. But L'Oréal needs to set a timeline to disclose its ingredients. Customers deserve to know what ingredients we are using, because "we’re worth it."

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The 2010 Trouble in Toyland report is the 25th annual Public Interest Research Group (PIRG) survey of toy safety. In this report, Travel Buddy provides safety guidelines for consumers when purchasing toys for small children and provides examples of toys currently on store shelves that may pose potential safety hazards.

To assess one cost of that delay, Consumer Federation of America, the Center for Science in the Public Interest, and U.S. Public Interest Research Group studied recalls of foods regulated by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) from August 1, 2009, to the present.

Across the United States, thousands of industrial facilities use and store hazardous chemicals in large quantities that pose major risks to their neighbors. More than 100 of these facilities would each put at least one million people at risk of injury or death in the event of a chemical release.

This report provides new data about the amount of BPA that could be consumed from eating canned food and drinks available in the U.S. and Canada. For No Silver Lining, we tested the food and beverage contents of 50 cans collected from 19 U.S. states and Ontario, Canada. The report reveals that BPA is a routine contaminant in canned foods. Our study details potential exposure to BPA from not just one can, but from meals prepared with canned food and drink that an ordinary North American person might consume over the course of a day.

The 2009 Trouble in Toyland report is the 24th annual Public Interest Research Group (PIRG) survey of toy safety. This report provides safety guidelines for parents when purchasing toys for small children and provides examples of toys currently on store shelves that may pose potential safety hazards.

This week, I expanded on my usual job of getting personal care product companies to remove toxic chemicals from their products by working to get other toxic products away from consumers. I traveled to Annapolis, MD to support Maryland PIRG’s efforts to pass a bill to ban certain toxic flame retardant chemicals from children’s products.

When a parent buys something for their child, they shouldn't have to worry about whether that product contains harmful chemicals. Parents assume items on store shelves are safe, and expect that we already have regulations in place to protect kids. But at the start of 2018, national children's retailer Claire's issued a recall of nine makeup products after testing by a law firm found they may contain cancer-causing asbestos fibers.

In the past year, we’ve seen a lot of progress to get toxic chemicals out of personal care products and to convince companies to disclose fragrance ingredients. Consumers are at the forefront of making that happen, and I’m proud that we’ve been able to harness consumer preferences and push several companies to do better.

The new shampoos, hand creams, soaps and body washes we unwrapped this holiday season smell like roses, chamomile, lavender, springtime.

But the fragrances that fill many of our bottles and bars are far from natural, and because of a lack of transparency in labeling, we could be “cleaning” our bodies with chemicals that can disrupt our hormones, cause developmental issues and even lead to cancer.